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Time Warner Cable Really Does Suck, Attorney General Finds
By
Rebecca Fishbein
Published Jun 9, 2016
Modified Jun 9, 2016
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By
Rebecca Fishbein
Published Jun 9, 2016
Modified Jun 9, 2016
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Time Warner Cable is the worst. This is not an exaggeration—last year TWC was statistically ranked the worst American company in terms of customer satisfaction, which should come as a surprise to no one who's essentially had to forge a death certificate to cancel their cable. But soon, TWC will become Charter Spectrum service, and while it's unclear whether that'll actually prevent us from getting surprise price hikes, the NY Attorney General wants to make it clear to the new cable Powers That Be that TWC is a miserable lying piece of shit that should keel over and die.
AG Eric Schneiderman launched an investigation into Time Warner Cable's Internet-speeds last year, finding that users do not believe they're being adequately provided with the "blazing fast" and "super-reliable" speeds for which the company charges such high prices. This is something anyone who's been unable to even access the internet three feet from the router can tell you, but Schneiderman's used early results from his probe to let Charter know they better shape up. Schneiderman's special advisor Tim Wu, the law professor and trailblazing net neutrality advocate, recently penned a letter to Charter citing the investigation and warning the company that TWC "has earned the miserable reputation it enjoys among consumers."
Wu points out that TWC has “been failing to take adequate or necessary steps to keep pace with the demand of [their] consumers," and that "[it] appears that TWC has been advertising its WiFi in ways that defy the technology’s technical capabilities, and has been provisioning some of its customers with equipment that simply cannot achieve the higher bandwidths the company has sold to them." Basically, while TWC promises premium internet speeds at premium prices, what you're really getting is a crappy Kate Spade knockoff with a stick-on label that peels right off and buffers New Girl every 30 seconds.
Charter issued a statement claiming they've "made significant investments in our core infrastructure which has enabled us to offer high-value products backed by a high-quality service organization throughout our footprint," which is a lot of words that mean very little until proven otherwise. For now, the company promises embattled TWC prisoners will get "greater value and more consumer friendly policies," with bonuses like minimum speeds of 60 mbps, no data caps, and no modem lease fees, but we'll believe it when we see it.
Then again, things could have been worse.
Tagged
ag schneiderman
attorney general
cable
charter
eric schneiderman
tim wu
time warner cable
twc
Rebecca Fishbein
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